Mindlink (11 page)

It sounded reasonable. He wasn’t constantly blasting her with
stuff from his head, just every so often. She had to put up with it long enough
to figure out how to keep breathing. “Okay. I don’t have a choice, I guess. Why
are you helping us? Won’t it be faster for you by yourself? I mean, you can
blend, but we can’t.”

“I have no special shield from the eyes of the Telhada,” he
said.

Purposeful footsteps echoed around them.

Made by someone wearing shoes.

His hand clapped over her mouth and then the rest of him
pressed up against her, scorching her spine as he dragged her back into the
room. He was so warm, she almost curled into him.

Then she heard the voices.

Two aliens, talking. In the hall, outside the door. She
couldn’t understand what they said, but Sam projected an image of guards finding
the other guards, the ones she’d zapped. She stood frozen in his half
embrace.

Fear spread, slinking into her veins, chilling her blood.
Aliens were coming to get them.

No, not them. Just her. Sam, though he looked and talked human,
was an alien too. One of
them
. His creepy alien body
touched hers, suddenly ominous and oppressive. Not comforting. She launched from
his arms and fled for the furthest wall, chest heaving.

Terror pounded through her. She couldn’t stop it. The aliens
would imprison her on the table. Hook her up to that machine again. Dump her in
a cell with no food or water and then gut her like a brain-dead organ donor.

Calmness drifted along the edges of her consciousness and she
latched onto it greedily. It wrapped around her like a blanket and stilled her
heaving chest. Even her hands stopped shaking. A feeling of not being alone,
edged with soothing peace, crept through her.

Strange. So strange, she recoiled. And then realized.

Sam. Tiptoeing through her head, pushing his will to her, into
her, infusing her consciousness with emotions not her own. Mind control.

“Stop it,” she hissed, heedful of Sid. The Russian didn’t need
to find out she’d mind-linked with an alien. “I don’t need your help. Get out of
my head.”

“Be calm.” His low voice whipped through the tiny room and
coiled around her, suffocating her. She was trapped with this alien who saw her
deepest parts and tried to control her. She backed away. Wax-figure Sam was way
preferable to this one.

“The workers are not aware we are hidden here. Do not give them
a reason to find us.”

Find us.
Us
. For better or worse,
they were in this together. If she wanted to live, she had to work with him. She
had to get past the fact that he was an alien. Past the mind-link. Hardest of
all, she had to get past the fact that being Ashley V didn’t matter. Every ounce
of her acting training kicked in. If nothing else, she could pretend she’d
gotten past it. She straightened her spine and her expression
simultaneously.

Fearless heroine in progress. Words formed on her tongue. Lines
a gutsy kidnapped human would say when faced with certain death.

“These are not the humans you’re looking for,” she muttered
with a Jedi-wave of her hand.

Sam stared at her. Okay, so she shouldn’t be stealing other
people’s scripts, but her own inner scriptwriter hadn’t won any awards.

The workers moved on and she breathed again. All the fingers of
fear had dissolved, too. Was that good or bad? “Will they be back?”

Sam consulted his tappy thing before answering. “Yes. Soon. Our
IDs are unique and easily tracked through the system. I must go. Wait here.”

Sam flipped the panels again and disappeared. He hadn’t
answered her question about his reason for helping them. Maybe it was better
left unanswered.

For now, she could be content he was helping.

She didn’t have to know his motives. Yet.

* * *

The link crowded into One’s mind the moment he pushed
the floating stretcher into the small room. It skittered below the surface of
his skin, bleeding through muscle and unleashing The Redhead’s images into his
consciousness. He’d been vaguely cognizant of it as he retrieved the stretcher,
but in her presence, color and sensation exploded in an inundation not entirely
unwelcome.

He’d relied on voice and shadow since birth to interpret the
world around him and suddenly new and cataclysmic dimensions had burst into
existence, as if he’d been handed the key to every puzzle in the universe but
given no time to solve them. His senses stood at full alert, primed for new
inputs, and strange restlessness clawed at him. Begging for more images. More
color. More of the indefinable energy The Redhead exuded.

More
,
more
,
more
.

He shook his head and refocused. Linking was forbidden to all
except those educated in its capabilities. The Telhada so vilified the dangers
of using it without training, citizens feared the link and avoided it at all
cost.

Yet another gross misrepresentation on the part of the
Telhada.

He left the stretcher to the side, noted the tall, useless Mora
Tuwa had fallen asleep, then handed The Redhead a stack of uniforms appropriated
from the medical center. He had already donned new clothing, grateful to lessen
his visibility and the uncomfortable exposure.

“What a fashion statement.” She wrinkled her nose and slid
lithe legs into the uniform. With deft rolls, she shortened the sleeves and legs
to accommodate the extra fabric. “Don’t you have anything
less...industrial?”

“Everyone wears the same clothing.” Anticipating her additional
questions, he added, “It prevents disorder and dissatisfaction. Unfortunately,
you are still unmistakably Mora Tuwa, even in the standard dress of
citizens.”

“Why don’t you ever smile?” She cocked her head and studied his
mouth.

Her scrutiny provoked a tingle which jolted across his lips. He
pursed them but it wouldn’t abate. “A smile serves no purpose.”

She stood and his mouth went dry. She wore the female uniform
as if draped in the queen’s own wardrobe. Simple lines became elegant and The
Redhead’s natural posture held the cloth in such a way to highlight her
proportions. A hot flash traveled the length of his back and blazed inside his
gut. He’d never noticed how clothing covered a person nor imagined his body’s
response to recalling what the person looked like beneath. As if he knew a
secret about her no one else knew and would never know.

Absurd.

She smiled and he realized he’d projected the memory of her
unclothed form. Somehow, she seemed pleased by this. He spun away to randomly
tap the handheld’s screen as a prickly burn traveled across the back of his
neck. It was an uncomfortable, confusing response. Yet so intriguing. With
almost every centimeter of her pale skin covered, he couldn’t eliminate the
image in his mind of it uncovered.

They had no time for this. Their location hadn’t been
discovered but it wouldn’t be a haven for much longer. “Clothe the others. We
must exit the Security Division as soon as possible.”

The air behind him stirred. As she approached, he could almost
hear them sliding away to be replaced by The Redhead’s physical presence. Still,
the touch on the back of his arm startled him. Heat pooled under her palm,
creating distressing friction against his sleeve. He removed his arm.

“Sam.”

Her insistence on labeling him with a human name was annoying.
However,
One
was an honorary title referring to his
former position.
ZXQ
had little meaning either. In
the course of a day, his entire life had disrupted to the point where a simple
identifier escaped him. “Yes?”

“We have to go back to the cells.”

“For what purpose? We must escape now while we are yet
undetected.”

She skirted him so they stood face-to-face. “There’s a little
boy. They didn’t grab him when they came for us. We can’t leave him.”

—
A
small
pile
of
clothes
and
hair
crumpled
in
a
corner
,
frightened
.
Walls
stretching
into
oblivion
.
Lonely
—

He must ensure the boy reached safety. A compulsion grew to
break down every wall between here and the boy. He stared at The Redhead. “What
is this you are doing? Cease.”

“Just sending you some pictures like you do to me. Deal with
it.” She blew a strand of hair out of her face and stared back at him without
apology, her eyes enormous.

The desire to shelter the child, to act immediately, swelled.
Save
him
.
Save
him
. “No, not the pictures. Something else. It feels
strange.”

“You mean how I tried to make you feel sorry for him? You don’t
like it? Well, too bad. If you can do calm, I can do compassion.” Her voice rose
as she continued to convey her point. “I don’t like it either, but that’s not
going to keep me from using it.”

The images vanished but the need to rescue the boy did not,
because the feeling wasn’t foreign or unnatural. It had just been more extreme.
Compassion
. It aptly described his inappropriate
tendency to be concerned with his subordinates. Something in his chest squeezed
and he shut his eyes, allowing it to grow instead of pushing it away.

He wanted more of The Redhead’s intense emotions through the
link. Immediately.

“Pull up a map so we can figure out how to find him,” The
Redhead said.

“You must remain here, hidden.” The boy’s rescue would be
difficult enough without splitting focus between his surroundings and The
Redhead. She was becoming a serious weakness—one he could not afford.

She motioned to the handheld. “What if you get lost?”

He doubted losing his way would be the biggest challenge but
she did have a sharp mind and a good sense of direction. “Very well. Do not send
further images. We must both concentrate on avoiding recapture. Are there any
others we must also locate?”

She hesitated. “The rest of the scientists. We should look for
them too.”

They slipped into the hall. She dogged his steps until they
reached the cell section, where she drew abreast, casting furtive glances from
side to side. She shivered and a pall crept over her features. “If the others
were ever here, we’re too late now. All the cells are empty. Recycling has come
through already.”

One
glanced at the handheld and
tapped a few commands. “No. One prisoner remains.”

Voices and footsteps echoed from the main hall. Workers.

He veered toward a branch off the main hallway and pushed her
up against the wall, flat. Her ire blasted through the link at the same moment
she elbowed him. He flinched but held her firm. She had not become aware of the
danger yet.

The sounds of workers traveled closer. She sucked in a breath
and the anger melted into abject terror. Blackness rushed through the link.
Instinctively, he drew her close and angled his body to hide her from the
workers if they rounded the corner.

No harm would come to her if he could prevent it.

Every breath pushed his torso into hers, creating a keen
awareness of their positions. His body hardened where it touched hers. His
senses heightened and overloaded with adrenaline. Too much. Too little.

All at once, the sounds of the guards grew faint. The threat
passed.

His pulse pounded in his throat, his temples, and he struggled
to even it out. When the clamor of his body had reduced by half, he dropped his
hand and allowed her to peel from the wall without a word. He didn’t have to
speak—she knew every thought.

Further down the offshoot hall, he counted off three cells and
then stopped. The boy lay in the corner. The Redhead’s hair swept forward to
cling to his sleeve as she peered around his biceps.

“Hey,” she whispered to the boy and moved toward the opening of
the cell. “We’re going to get you out of here.”

He didn’t respond and kept his face buried under his arm.

“Allow me,”
One
said and repeated
her statement in Hahlan.

The boy burrowed his head deeper into the huddle of his arms
and legs. Clearly he didn’t trust anyone.

“Maybe you should go in,” The Redhead suggested. “Deactivate
the force field.”

Nodding,
One
tapped off the
containment frequency and entered the cell to kneel by the boy. The Redhead
followed at his back and crowded up against him.

With a slight rustle, one dark eye blinked up from the depths
of the small, hunched form.

One
almost reached out to the boy,
but stopped. “We must go if we hope to escape.”

The boy lifted his head, unfolding as if he’d been in the
cramped position for quite some time. His gaze didn’t leave the floor, and he
didn’t stand.

“Tell him I was in the cell next to him,” The Redhead said. The
boy’s posture didn’t change with the translation. “Why won’t he look at you? Did
they torture him or something?”

—
small
,
defenseless
child
manacled
to
a
table
.
Interrogation
.
Excruciating
pain
—

One
glanced back at her with a
frown and the flow of images terminated. “Avoiding eye contact is customary to
prevent linking implants. A precaution you may now appreciate. I’ll inform him
we are already linked so he should not fear.” He repeated it in Hahlan.

“The octopus links through people’s eyes? No wonder the whole
process of implanting the thing was so painful.” She blinked rapidly. “Is there
like a USB plug sticking out of my eyeball now?”